Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks
Background: We aimed to address the knowledge gap regarding mental health in Ukrainian children and parents one year after Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion including associations with exposure to drone attacks. Methods: A cross-sectional, quota-sampled survey was conducted among parents of chi...
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Elsevier
2025-05-01
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| Series: | Comprehensive Psychiatry |
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| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010440X25000173 |
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| author | Amna Naeem Iftikhar Sikder Shanshan Wang Emily S. Barrett Nancy Fiedler Miraj Ahmad Uyen-Sa D.T. Nguyen Dmytro Martsenkovskyi Irina Holovanova Madelyn Hsiao-Rei Hicks Ubydul Haque |
| author_facet | Amna Naeem Iftikhar Sikder Shanshan Wang Emily S. Barrett Nancy Fiedler Miraj Ahmad Uyen-Sa D.T. Nguyen Dmytro Martsenkovskyi Irina Holovanova Madelyn Hsiao-Rei Hicks Ubydul Haque |
| author_sort | Amna Naeem |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Background: We aimed to address the knowledge gap regarding mental health in Ukrainian children and parents one year after Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion including associations with exposure to drone attacks. Methods: A cross-sectional, quota-sampled survey was conducted among parents of children aged 3–17 in Ukraine one year after the invasion (n = 858). Participants completed self-reported screening measures of the Pediatric Symptom Checklist-17, Child and Adolescent Trauma Screen–Caregiver, Patient Health Questionnaire-9, Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7, the International Trauma Questionnaire, and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) 3-Item Loneliness Scale. We analyzed scores in relation to drone attack exposure using logistic regression. Findings: Many children aged 3–6 years had scores suggestive of ADHD (24.2 %), conduct disorder (20.5 %), and anxiety/mood disorder (12.1 %). Results were similar among children aged 7–17 (anxiety/mood disorder: 24.1 %, conduct disorder: 14.5 %, and ADHD: 14 %). Of the 45.0 % of children aged 3–6 and 57.0 % aged 7–17 exposed to post-invasion trauma, 21.8 % and 17.6 % had clinically relevant levels of PTSD symptoms, respectively. Parental symptoms met screening criteria for depressive disorder in 46.7 % and for anxiety disorder in 24.2 %. All parents reported post-invasion trauma, with 24.5 % screening positive for PTSD. Child mental health disorder odds increased with parental PTSD (OR 1.85, 95 %CI 1.29–2.72) and symptoms meeting screening criteria for depressive disorder (OR 1.99, 95 %CI 1.15–2.56). The odds of children aged 7–17 having clinically relevant levels of PTSD symptoms increased with parental symptoms screening positive for depressive disorder (OR 6.0, 95 %CI 2.0–18.3), anxiety disorder (OR 3.48, 95 %CI 1.76–6.8), and PTSD (OR 3.23, 95 % 1.67–6.2). Parents had a higher prevalence of screening positive for PTSD in high-intensity drone attack regions (28.9 %) than low- and moderate-intensity regions (25.0 % and 20.5 %, respectively, p = 0.04). Interpretation: The high prevalence of children and parents in Ukraine with symptoms screening positive for mental disorders indicates an urgent need for services for school-age children and parents in this war-affected region. High-intensity drone attacks increase the risk of parents screening positive for PTSD. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-aba6dc9e7c104694b8f115f77cf6f1df |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 0010-440X |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-05-01 |
| publisher | Elsevier |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Comprehensive Psychiatry |
| spelling | doaj-art-aba6dc9e7c104694b8f115f77cf6f1df2025-08-20T03:06:25ZengElsevierComprehensive Psychiatry0010-440X2025-05-0113915259010.1016/j.comppsych.2025.152590Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacksAmna Naeem0Iftikhar Sikder1Shanshan Wang2Emily S. Barrett3Nancy Fiedler4Miraj Ahmad5Uyen-Sa D.T. Nguyen6Dmytro Martsenkovskyi7Irina Holovanova8Madelyn Hsiao-Rei Hicks9Ubydul Haque10Department of Statistics, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, PakistanDepartment of Information Systems, Cleveland State University, USADepartment of Population & Community Health, School of Public Health, University of North Texas Health Science Center, Fort Worth, TX, USAEnvironmental and Occupational Sciences Institute, Rutgers University, 170 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA; Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, Rutgers School of Public Health, Piscataway, NJ, USAEnvironmental and Occupational Sciences Institute, Rutgers University, 170 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA; Department of Environmental and Occupational Health and Justice, Rutgers School of Public Health, Piscataway, NJ, USACell Biology & Neuroscience, School of Arts and Sciences, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ, USADepartment of Population & Community Health, School of Public Health, University of North Texas Health Science Center, Fort Worth, TX, USADepartment of Psychiatry and Narcology, Bogomolets National Medical University, Kyiv, UkrainePoltava State Medical University, Poltava, UkraineDepartment of Psychiatry, UMass Chan Medical School, Worcester, MA, USADepartment of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, Rutgers School of Public Health, Piscataway, NJ, USA; Rutgers Global Health Institute, Rutgers School of Public Health, New Brunswick, NJ, USA; Corresponding author at: Rutgers Global Health Institute, Rutgers School of Public Health, New Brunswick, NJ, USA.Background: We aimed to address the knowledge gap regarding mental health in Ukrainian children and parents one year after Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion including associations with exposure to drone attacks. Methods: A cross-sectional, quota-sampled survey was conducted among parents of children aged 3–17 in Ukraine one year after the invasion (n = 858). Participants completed self-reported screening measures of the Pediatric Symptom Checklist-17, Child and Adolescent Trauma Screen–Caregiver, Patient Health Questionnaire-9, Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7, the International Trauma Questionnaire, and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) 3-Item Loneliness Scale. We analyzed scores in relation to drone attack exposure using logistic regression. Findings: Many children aged 3–6 years had scores suggestive of ADHD (24.2 %), conduct disorder (20.5 %), and anxiety/mood disorder (12.1 %). Results were similar among children aged 7–17 (anxiety/mood disorder: 24.1 %, conduct disorder: 14.5 %, and ADHD: 14 %). Of the 45.0 % of children aged 3–6 and 57.0 % aged 7–17 exposed to post-invasion trauma, 21.8 % and 17.6 % had clinically relevant levels of PTSD symptoms, respectively. Parental symptoms met screening criteria for depressive disorder in 46.7 % and for anxiety disorder in 24.2 %. All parents reported post-invasion trauma, with 24.5 % screening positive for PTSD. Child mental health disorder odds increased with parental PTSD (OR 1.85, 95 %CI 1.29–2.72) and symptoms meeting screening criteria for depressive disorder (OR 1.99, 95 %CI 1.15–2.56). The odds of children aged 7–17 having clinically relevant levels of PTSD symptoms increased with parental symptoms screening positive for depressive disorder (OR 6.0, 95 %CI 2.0–18.3), anxiety disorder (OR 3.48, 95 %CI 1.76–6.8), and PTSD (OR 3.23, 95 % 1.67–6.2). Parents had a higher prevalence of screening positive for PTSD in high-intensity drone attack regions (28.9 %) than low- and moderate-intensity regions (25.0 % and 20.5 %, respectively, p = 0.04). Interpretation: The high prevalence of children and parents in Ukraine with symptoms screening positive for mental disorders indicates an urgent need for services for school-age children and parents in this war-affected region. High-intensity drone attacks increase the risk of parents screening positive for PTSD.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010440X25000173ChildAdolescentParentMental healthTraumaPTSD |
| spellingShingle | Amna Naeem Iftikhar Sikder Shanshan Wang Emily S. Barrett Nancy Fiedler Miraj Ahmad Uyen-Sa D.T. Nguyen Dmytro Martsenkovskyi Irina Holovanova Madelyn Hsiao-Rei Hicks Ubydul Haque Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks Comprehensive Psychiatry Child Adolescent Parent Mental health Trauma PTSD |
| title | Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks |
| title_full | Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks |
| title_fullStr | Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks |
| title_full_unstemmed | Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks |
| title_short | Parent-child mental health in Ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks |
| title_sort | parent child mental health in ukraine in relation to war trauma and drone attacks |
| topic | Child Adolescent Parent Mental health Trauma PTSD |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010440X25000173 |
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